I found I was running out of calories earlier than I wanted to as well, and my solution was to delay wating for a while in the morning. I found that avoiding the initial instinct to eat for a few hours in the morning left me ok, and not really hungry. This way, I have more calories left to eat later in the day, when I did feel more hunger. I eat the same amount, over the same number of hours, I just start later and finish later, and I'm more satisfied.

Your hormonal changes kept you from being hungry until now, but this is when hormones change again, and hunger comes back. It will be a little harder after this.

 

My husband does this! He had surgery Oct 2012 and will often wait until 10 or 11 to eat in the morning and he is generally up by 5a. He enjoys hot coffee (and his vitamins of course!****il mid-morning and is much happier with his overall intake when he does that. 

I notice when I start eating later I do better as well. The trick is, staying in bed longer - LOL.

Seriously, I got help for it many years ago.Now,  I photograph (on my pphone or tablet) the food before i eat it. When I have a binge, I pull up the picture and look at what I ate and tell myself. "You had the prescribed amount of food. This is what you ate. See the shrimp?  See the broccolli?"  And i remember/recollect/re-imagine how it tasted.  Basically, I am telling myself that I had head hunger.

Then I follow this up with a yoga mantra. "I am spirit. This mood is temporary. The want/long is temporary. It will pass."

And recite this in my head about 16-20 times.

Then I get as far away from food and try to distract myself for 20 minutes. And it has usually passed.

 

That is really really helpful.  i have been having some bingey moments lately and they scare the hell out of me.  I am writing your mantra down right now!

Having pics of your most recent meal on hand also helps fight the binge. It reminds you that you *really* ate and there is no reason to be hungry (beyond head hunger).

Great idea! I've never been one to have a mantra and recite it to myself to get over whatever I'm into, but it sure can't hurt to try. Thank You!!

SkinnySci,

What led you to that solution, with the photo?  Was it the suggestion of a therapist, a book or your own device?  It seems like it will help.  I like it because it isn't more eating, it's educating and nurturing your brain/spirit.  Thanks for sharing. 

My own device. Therapy showed me that what I like about eating is: 1) the eating/food/taste experience itself, 2) the companionship of a meal shared with friends/loved ones and 3) memories. I literally will eat/smell something a relive an associated memory. So my thought process was that I should take a picture to remind myself what I ate, that it was enough, and to relive the experience I had when eating without actually eating the food.

It has helped me with head hunger for 1.5 years now.

On the mediatation and mantra, that came about because my surgeon told all of us at pre-op seminar to learn mediation. I think it was because he wanted us to become more attentive of our physical and emotional feelings while we ate (I.e are we full? 75% full etc).  However, I have found the mediation course has had other benefits such as forgiving oneself when stupid little mistakes are made (i am a perfectionist...all the time), and to remind oneself that whatever strong feeling I am having (e.g.head hunger, annoyance at somene over something dumb to get annoyed about) it will pass. It is temporary. It may even last 2 or more days, but in the span of a year, the situation/feeling is temporary.

I have the same problems!  Somedays, I am hungry all day long and it scares me because I could easily slide back into my old habits.  Then, there are days, where I'm at the end of the day and I haven't thought about food much at all and am only at 500 calories.  I'm not sure why this happens, but I am a binge eater as well, so when I'm really having a craving, I drink an entire bottle of water and wait a little while and see if I'm still hungry.  If I still am after that, sometimes I'll eat pistachios or something else that satisfies my craving to "eat."  It does scare me though how easy it would be to graze all day.  It's going to be a constant battle for the rest of my life.  Ugh.